“What are your plans for tomorrow?”
“Riccardo and I will be looking over some more of the aerial photos, and then we’ll consult with Amir when we get back to the site about some applications for the team linguist position,” he said softly.
“If I can be of help, let me know,” she said.
He nodded agreeably. “It’s been a long day. I’m turning in,” he said. He laid his fork alongside his plate and pushed back his chair. Grabbing his half-full wine glass, he made for the door.
“No crème brulee?” Lucrezia called after him.
“I need to go to Rome for a couple of days, chérie. Would you still like to come?” asked Andrea. The light from the eastern dawn flooded the terrace where Maria had laid out a small breakfast of croissants, coffee and cream, pecorino, and fig jam. Andrea opened a croissant, spread jam on one side, and topped it with a thin slice of cheese. “You remember Blackburn?”
“The codex thief? How could I forget?” Robert Blackburn was an infamous, slippery thief who owned the Tut Tut Bazaar in Cairo. It was rumored that he had stolen the original codex, but Justine suspected that was a ruse to protect the real villain, the Egyptian Supreme Director of Antiquities. Still full from the night before, Justine settled for a cup of coffee. She had already dressed in her running clothes and carried her tennis shoes.
“Exactly. I have reason to believe that he might be in Rome.”
“I thought he was still in an Egyptian prison,” Justine responded, surprised. “Is that who you are going to see in Rome? So, if you find him, you’ll walk right up to him and ask for the original codex? Or tell him Stanford is waiting with their new fangled machine?”
“Don’t be cute!” said Andrea. “He’s been a prickly thorn in Egyptian sides for some time, so I understand they released him with the agreement that he would leave the country. All rumor, of course.”
“How will we find him? In the phone book, perhaps?” Justine began to put on her running shoes.
“In a little antiquities shop, I’m led to believe.”
“You have the most interesting informants. Tell me, do you seduce all of them?” Justine cocked her head and glared at Andrea.
“Agitated this morning, aren’t we?”
“What are your intentions toward my father?” Justine drained her coffee and picked up a small piece of pecorino. She stood and stared down at Andrea. Waiting.
“I’m not that proactive, my friend. Except where my work ambitions are involved. As for your father, I find him attractive. You object?”
“I don’t want him hurt, Andrea.” Justine didn’t wait for an answer.
THE LONG ROAD FROM TARQUINIA, the Etruscan city more than two days’ ride northwest of Rome, was muddy from the spring rains. The damp riders and their entourage had camped the night before near Ostia, to the west. But now the warm afternoon sunlight of early spring reflected off the golden chest of Achilles as the Greek god received armor from his mother, Thetis. This finely embossed imagery of Achilles in bronze was carved across the fashionable chariot, its long pole issuing from the head of a boar and ending in the head of a beaked bird that protruded between proud black steeds. This magnificent chariot carried Lucumo Tarquinius Priscus and his wife, Tanaquil, a haruspice learned in the ways of divination. Had she not known, when the eagle crowned her husband with a cap, that he was the chosen one? That a new city would give them a chance to claim the glory that was rightfully theirs?
As Lucumo drove their lathered horses up the rise to the foot of the Palatine Hills, he cried out, “Ah, this place will host my games. Horse racing and boxing in a Circus Maximus!”
“But first the swamps will have to be drained, my husband,” said Tanaquil, who had more mastery in mind than childish games.
The first Tarquin king of Rome, Justine thought, continuing her musings as she steered her Spider into Via Cristoforo Colombo toward the Coliseum. Her imagination often entertained her, especially this morning, as she was once again captivated by the majesty of Rome. Justine forced herself to fast-forward twenty-eight centuries and turn her full attention to the chaotic traffic. Not so different from Cairo, she thought. The Coliseum, the world’s best-known monument to brutality . . . yet now in the twenty-first century, as if in irony, it is lighted all night when a death penalty is commuted or abolished anywhere on earth. She turned right onto Via La Spezia and swung into Cavour Boulevard, heading toward the middle of Rome.
Andrea had left Fiesole the day before, coaxing Justine to Rome with rumors of Blackburn, shopping . . . and a certain baroness. They would meet near the Piazza Navone, at the Chiesa di San Luigi dei Francesi, where Andrea planned to meet the daughter of an old classmate. A baroness. I wonder what she’ll be like? Justine mused. An elegant diva? Reserved? Haughty? According to Andrea, the family history of the Baroness Miranda Taxis and her husband ran to daunting. Justine braced herself as she approached Saint Maggiore Piazza, where human and vehicular traffic made inroads impenetrable.
Justine finally pulled into the Piazza Navone, with its baroque palazzo, magnificent fountains, street hawkers, artists, musicians, and tourists. The enticing aromas of sausage pizza and sizzling pigeon rose from the street-side cafés. Built to be used as an arena 2,000 year earlier, it had been paved over in the fifteenth century and was now a community market. Bernini’s Fontana dei Quattro Flumi, his Fountain of the Four Rivers, depicted the Nile, Ganges, Danube, and Río de la Plata flowing together, connecting the known world.
In front of the boutique Hotel Michelangelo, situated in the southwest corner of the piazza, Justine unloaded her single buckskin bag and handed it, with her car keys, to the waiting bellman. She would not take time to check in, as she was expected at the church by noon. Following the bellman’s directions, Justine walked gingerly across the piazza and turned into an alleyway that ended in a smaller piazza housing the church—and, across the narrow street—the French Embassy. In spite of herself, she was looking forward to a day of adventure with Andrea, who was always good for a surprise or two.
Andrea was sitting on the church steps, her white linen slacks protected by a copy of Italia, a spaghetti strap hanging down over her sunburned shoulder.
“Waiting long?” asked Justine, sitting beside her friend and giving her a light squeeze. “Where’s the Baroness?”
“Just got here,” said Andrea, kissing Justine on the cheek. “Before Miranda gets here, let me tell you a little bit of her intriguing history. Her husband, William Taxis, earned his title and surname from a distant uncle in Austria who invented the notion of paid transportation. Hence, the ‘taxi.’ And, her great grandfather, Sir James Rennell, was the British ambassador to Rome during World War I.”
“Impressive!” exclaimed Justine. She wondered whether Sir Rennell
